A blog about societal, cultural, and civilizational collapse, and how to stave it off or survive it. Named after the legendary character "Crazy Eddie" in Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle's "The Mote in God's Eye." Expect news and views about culture, politics, economics, technology, and science fiction.
I've written about pandemics before here and pointed out that they are on topic for this blog. In May, it was to note that "history may not repeat, but it certainly does rhyme and also that resource depletion and environmental degradation aren't the only threats to civilization." The next month, it was to remind my readers that "pandemics are like asteroid strikes; both combine science fiction with the collapse of civilization. We need to be prepared for both of them." In both entries, I was referring to infections like influenza, SARS, and bubonic plague, which spread, sicken, and kill quickly. However, all of us have been living through a slow-motion plague for the past 35 years--HIV/AIDS. As last Sunday was World AIDS Day, it's past time to recognize this dread disease here.
In the early, dark days of the AIDS crisis, the government was little help to those suffering from the newly discovered disease. So two groups took it upon themselves to spur politicians into action. In this week's DNews Screening room, Laci Green reviews the Oscar nominated documentary 'How To Survive a Plague' which chronicles their harrowing work.
Things have gotten somewhat better in the U.S. over the past 30 years, even if 2 million people die worldwide from the disease. Follow over the jump for two stories from KPBS marking this year's World AIDS Day that I originally included in tonight's Overnight News Digest: Science Saturday (Die, Selfish Gene!).
After a diving accident left Jason DiSanto paralyzed from the neck down in 2009, he had to learn how to navigate life from a powered wheelchair, which he controls with a sip-and-puff system. Users sip or puff air into a straw mounted on their wheelchair to execute four basic commands that drive the chair. But results from a new clinical study offer hope that sip-and-puff users like DiSanto could gain a higher level of independence than offered by this common assistive technology.
In the study, individuals with paralysis were able to use a tongue-controlled technology to access computers and execute commands for their wheelchairs at speeds that were significantly faster than those recorded in sip-and-puff wheelchairs, but with equal accuracy. This study is the first to show that the wireless and wearable Tongue Drive System outperforms sip-and-puff in controlling wheelchairs. Sip-and-puff is the most popular assistive technology for controlling a wheelchair.
The Tongue Drive System is controlled by the position of the user’s tongue. A magnetic tongue stud lets them use their tongue as a joystick to drive the wheelchair. Sensors in the tongue stud relay the tongue’s position to a headset, which then executes up to six commands based on the tongue position.
Follow over the jump for more health research from UCSD, Texas A&M, University of Georgia, and University of Massachusetts.
The University of California, San Diego recognized in its own way that we live in science fiction times in Imagination Gets a Boost with $1 Million Gift. ViaSat named Founding Partner of Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination in recognition of donation
By Judy Piercey
November 21, 2013
The University of California, San Diego is home to the first and only Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination, honoring the vision of "2001: A Space Odyssey" author Arthur C. Clarke. Today, the campus is announcing a $1 million gift from San Diego-based satellite and digital communications innovator ViaSat Inc. (VSAT) that will continue Clarke's greatest legacy: imagination. In recognition of this charitable donation, ViaSat has been named Founding Partner of the Clarke Center.
"ViaSat's co-founders include UC San Diego alumni, and they understand the importance of imagination in seeking new frontiers," said Chancellor Pradeep K. Khosla. "The company's generous gift will help the Clarke Center honor the late author and innovator through cultural, scientific and medical transformations. These occur when imagination is more effectively incorporated into research and our daily lives."
Britain's Sir Arthur C. Clarke, celebrated for his multi-disciplinary legacy in science and engineering, is also considered one of the most inspiring and engaging science fiction writers of all time for such classics as "Childhood's End," "Rendezvous with Rama" as well as "2001: A Space Odyssey." His visionary books and papers have fueled the imaginations and avocations of young and old for more than six decades.
One of his visionary ideas was space tourism, as depicted in 2001: A Space Odyssey.
As FlickFeast wrote, "While still not commonplace, space tourism is a reality." Another story from Space.com illustrates this: How Do You Train to Become a Space Tourist?
By Katia Moskvitch, SPACE.com Contributor
November 30, 2013 12:00pm ET
LONDON — Piloting fighter jets, floating in zero gravity and spinning at a belly-flattening speed in a centrifuge are not the things a regular tourist is asked to do before a dream holiday. But this is exactly what Per Wimmer has been doing during 13 years of waiting for his trip — to outer space.
For the 45-year-old London-based Danish entrepreneur and financier, it won't even be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. So far, he has bought three tickets from companies offering space tourism: Virgin Galactic, Space Adventures and XCOR Aerospace.
Wimmer expects to blast into the blackness overhead within the next 18 months, "on whichever rocket becomes available first," he said. When he first found out that private citizens had an opportunity to take a peek beyond Earth's surface, it took him less than 48 hours to pony up the $100,000 to sign up.
My friend Nebris has a shorter formulation of "we live in science fiction times"--SciFi is Now.
Cities should be a solution not a problem for human beings. The city of Curitiba has demonstrated for the past 40 years how to transform problems into cost-effective solutions that can be applied in most cities around the world.
A Convenient Truth: Urban Solutions from Curitiba, Brazil is an informative, inspirational documentary aimed at sharing ideas to provoke environment-friendly and cost-effective changes in cities worldwide. The documentary focuses on innovations in transportation, recycling, social benefits including affordable housing, seasonal parks, and the processes that transformed Curitiba into one of the most livable cities in the world.
The film includes interviews from world renowned Curitiba's mayors Jaime Lerner and Cassio Tanigushi, as well as other brilliant minds who made Curitiba a world class model.
That's not a bad idea. "End of Suburbia" is a downer and getting dated. I might just replace it with something optimistic about a greener future for cities. After all, I am a Crazy Eddie.
Athens, Ga. - Many holiday shopping lists include online purchases, but is that website safe for credit cards? A security proponent at the University of Georgia has some tips for secure online shopping for shoppers making their lists and checking them twice.
"Use your head when doing your online shopping this holiday season," said Laura Heilman, a security awareness and education manager in the university's Enterprise Information Technology Services office. "Do not shop on public Wi-Fi networks or on public computers. And, avoid making purchases directly through links in emails."
Heilman suggests shopping online with a credit card, instead of a debit card.
Bitcoin—the currency of choice for buying illegal goods online—has cultivated quite the bad-boy image. But some entrepreneurs believe a wholesome makeover could take this unregulated digital currency mainstream, and what could be more wholesome than holiday shopping?
On Black Friday, Bitcoin boosters are urging shoppers to ditch their credit cards and open up their Bitcoin wallets. And shoppers like David Allison are doing just that. He's been giving a lot of thought to what he'll buy for his wife this Christmas.
"My wife and I are expecting a baby in March," he says. "And I know she loves the concept of nesting."
Follow over the jump for more about technology and security.
I reminded my readers at the end of San Diego election news from KPBS that "this is still a Detroit-based blog, even when observing other cities' politics from afar." Here is another entry in that vein, as I pass along KPBS's reporting on the implimentation of the Affordable Care Act AKA Obamacare in California. It makes for a good mirror in which to see the process as it was intended. That means any issues will be the result of intrinsic factors, not outside interference.
There have been some of the latter going on here in Michigan, for while Medicaid was indeed expanded here, it took a big fight between Governor Snyder and the state legislature, and the expansion didn't have immediate effect. Also, there is no state insurance exchange; people from Michigan have to rely on the federal site, which has been having its issues. That means that there are too many confounding variables to use Michigan to judge the merits of the program.
I begin KPBS's coverage with this video, which comes first under my preference that "if it moves, it leads."
Doug Blackwood and his wife have a great deal on a rental in Ocean Beach. But their rent is going up in January. The couple hopes to qualify for an Obamacare subsidy that might keep their budget in check.
On Thanksgiving Day, Comet ISON passed about 685-thousand miles above the surface of the sun -- the comet's closest approach on a projected path around our solar system's star. Data from this close encounter is providing clues about the comet and its interaction with the solar atmosphere -- which can help us understand more about the sun itself. Also, Holiday delivery, Satellite to Japan, Chief Scientist's visits, High tech agreement, Bug off and more!
Follow over the jump for more from NASA plus a bonus article from Georgia Tech on a surprising finding from Curiosity.
This week, I'm showing "An Inconvenient Truth" to my students again. To mark the occasion, I present the climate news from campuses on the campaign trail that I've included in the most recent Overnight News Digests on Daily Kos.
I begin with an entry that relates to the first question I ask my students, "What evidence first convinced Al Gore about the connection between carbon dioxide and global warming?" The answer was the carbon dioxide data collected by Roger Revelle.* It turns out that the University of California, San Diego presents a medal in honor of Revelle, as can be seen in 2013 Roger Revelle Medalist, Walter Munk.
Referred to as the "greatest living oceanographer," Walter Munk is widely recognized for his groundbreaking investigations of wave propagation, tides, currents, circulation and other aspects of the ocean and Earth. The 95-year-old scientist and alumnus is still active at Scripps Institution of Oceanography. His accomplishments have been recognized by prestigious organizations around the world, from the Kyoto Prize to the Crafoord Prize.
